a blog about faith, hope, and mostly love

soundtrack to my life…

There are certain songs that are forever connected to any number of events, circumstances, or people in life and when you hear the song again, it immediately sends you back to that time or that place or that person or group of people. Here are just a few of such songs for me… complete with video…

run by snow patrol

at the time i heard it, i was in a relationship that was ending, and it will always make me a little melancholy. plus it’s just a beautiful melancholy kinda song. i’m not exactly sure what the song is about, but the lyrics are kinda frickin depressing but i’m not entirely sure why.

barely breathing by duncan sheik

heard this song around the same time i was falling for this guy in my creative writing class. it was a bizarre and educational time for me. anyway, this song makes me think of him and that time. although the acoustic version is so much better than radio edit’s pop version – per usual.

what’s on your mind (pure energy) by information society

when i was in 11th grade I went to a public school for the first time since I switched to a Christian school in 3rd grade. one of my first classes was health and on my first day i sat between kevin bloom, the resident pothead who had been left back twice, and mark schlazer. mark made me a mix tape – yes a mix tape. it makes me smile to this day. no one had ever made a tape for me before and only one other person since.

when the book and subsequent movie high fidelity came out, and rob fleming (john cusack’s character) says something about the art of making a mix tape, i totally thought about mark schlazer and the fact that he made me a 90 minute tape of all his favorite songs. and the fact that mark had a girlfriend who totally hated me for some crazy reason.

anyway, pure energy was on this tape. mark had even written a blurb about every single song – i had handwritten notes about all the songs he chose. and of course i have since lost this tape and the notes which really pisses me off. but i still love this song and i cant help but smile. i should look mark up. maybe.

friends by michael w smith

my best friend Matthew and I used to sing this song as a duet in 8th grade when we were in Rejoice together – it was a singing group that went to different churches and sang in chapel a lot. Good times.

anyway, matthew killed himself when we were 15 and that song was sung at his memorial service. i have no idea how the singers got through the whole thing, but they did. so yeah, that song takes me back.

jumper by third eye blind

it’s a song about suicidal tendencies. It is a great song that naturally makes me think of matthew. this song was also a point of endearment for me and my friend jamie who i met online on some website. we were both writers working on stories and got to chatting one night on ICQ (does anyone use that any more?) about a story he wrote about a friend’s suicide. every time i heard this song after that, i thought of jamie and what might have been if he didnt live 3000 miles away from me. but it’s pointless to speculate really.

in the end by linkin park

and really that whole hybrid theory album. i listened to it over and over again while driving in my car from LA to denver in october of 2001. it was after sept 11th had happened and i had decided to visit my brother in denver and was so wound up that i drove straight from LA to denver just making stops at gas stations through the night. and i pretty much just listened to that one album the entire 14 hours or whatever it was. it just really resonated with me at the time. it’s all about hopelessness and despair and futility and pain and suffering. good times.

that’s it for now. i know there’s more, but i suppose i should go get something productive done now…